Is Trillium Trading a joke?

I have been offered a position as an equity trader by Trillium for a start date next year. On this forum and online the firm seems to have quite a bad reputation as a joke of prop shop. I realize that their trader failure rate is high, they use mostly discretionary trading, and the base is EXCEPTIONALLY low... however they must be somewhat successful given they've been around for pretty long. 

I am thinking of accepting this position as it has the most upside short term for me as a 22 year old graduate. It seems to be an alternative to more traditional finance roles, but I do not want to completely waste my time for a year or two and be left with very few exit opportunities. 

Can anyone provide insight into any of my assumptions made above and give some advice as to whether this is a viable path going forward? 

10 Comments
 

Based on the most helpful WSO content, Trillium Trading is a reputable place to start your career. It's true that the world of prop trading can be challenging and not everyone finds success, but that doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on the firm. It's more about the nature of the industry and the individual's ability to thrive in it.

As for your concerns about the base salary and the discretionary trading approach, these are common characteristics in the prop trading world. The potential for high earnings often comes from performance bonuses rather than a high base salary. And discretionary trading allows for flexibility and the ability to capitalize on market inefficiencies, which can be a good thing if you have a knack for it.

In terms of exit opportunities, it's important to remember that trading skills are highly transferable. The experience you gain at Trillium could open doors to other opportunities in finance, whether that's at another prop shop, a hedge fund, or elsewhere.

So, if you're excited about the role and feel that it aligns with your career goals, it could be a great opportunity. Just remember, like any job, it will come with its challenges and it will be up to you to make the most of it. Good luck!

Sources: What to expect from a prop trading job?, I'm Trying to get into Prop-Trading From a Non-Target School, My Experience at Trillium Trading - 1st Year NYC

I'm an AI bot trained on the most helpful WSO content across 17+ years.
 

What are your other options? I had a S&T role in my back pocket and opted for the S&T over that and glad I did to be honest but have friends at Trillium and they seem to enjoy it albeit not profitable yet 

 

The firm itself probably has some traders who do pretty well trading TA and drawing lines on charts. Becoming good at this has no exit opportunities other than Instagram Forex Course seller. They have a high P/L split, so good traders do well, but this is not a shop or career starter for new grads. If you end up terrible, you have no transferrable or marketable skills. There is a difference between an options market-making shop, hedge fund, or proprietary trading firm using quantitative methods vs drawing lines on a chart.

 

To clear something up here, very little of what Trillium trades is pure technical. Most traders who don't find success do indeed have decent exits to careers as equity analysts. 

 
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I think few successful traders at the "legit" firms would be able to trade in a similar way without the infrastructure of those firms whether it's research infrastructure for quant trading, low latency infrastructure for high frequency trading, some client flows/relationships or just overall scale. The trading style of those firms leads to the sum being a lot more than the parts which is why the most successful firms tend to have moats around their core businesses. Even when senior people move between these firms it is often quite difficult to replicate their previous trades let alone at a place like Trillium which is why it's rare or unheard for successful traders at these bigger firms to move to bucket shops even if the pnl split is much better there. 

I'm not really sure how much capital successful traders at these places get but it's going to be a small fraction of what PMs at multi-manager hedge funds get so most of what is left is small capacity difficult to automate opportunities although if you can make 2 million pnl and get paid around 1 million that is still pretty good.

 

PrimeInvest broker, was a scam from the start,and unfortunately, my concerns were justified. After I deposited the sum of $15,000.00 and my profits was $115,000, I faced constant obstacles trying to withdraw my funds. unfortunately I seek a legal assistance to recover my money back. And then I was recommended to a reliable recovery expert, and i reached out to him through his email (rodrigueztaylormoore AT gmail . com) and he helped me get my money back, you can reach out to him for help if you fall a victim.

 

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